


déjà vu

by felissilvestris



Category: Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
Genre: kittan meeting anne for the first time. it's cute i thimk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:07:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23076790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/felissilvestris/pseuds/felissilvestris
Summary: When Kittan meets his niece for the first time, he can't quite place where he's seen this before. Then, he does.
Relationships: Implied Kittan Bachika/Kamina
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	déjà vu

When Kittan finally arrived at his destination, he opened the door to a surprisingly empty hospital room - he expected Dayakka and Kiyal to enthusiastically greet him, likely being the only people in the room who would be anywhere near inclined to stand up at the moment, but they were mysteriously absent. On the bed, though, was his oldest baby sister, holding a brand new baby of her own. She offered him a smile, and gestured to be quiet with a finger over her mouth. At this, he rolls his eyes in a way that only another Bachika would understand -  _ I’ve held so many more babies than you! I know what I’m doing. _

The outside world seemed to melt away as he approached her bedside, sure to be as gentle as possible when he sat near the foot of the hospital bed. Once he got back to work the next morning, he was sure his stress level would skyrocket right back up, but right now, this was all that mattered in the world. He could barely catch a glimpse of the infant in her arms from the angle, as she was facing her mother’s chest - the only things visible were an impossibly small hand clenched over Kiyoh’s sternum, and a little tuft of Bachika blonde hair. Still, this was enough to just about melt his heart into a puddle on the floor.

“So… how’re you feeling?” He whispers. He hasn’t been this quiet in years - it’s a stark contrast to his normal loud-mouthedness. Kiyoh discerned that this side of him would take some re-adjusting to - she hadn’t seen it since Kiyal was a baby.

“Well, if I’m being honest, I don’t think I’ve ever been this sore in my  _ life _ , and I haven’t showered in two days. I haven’t eaten yet, either, but… I think it’s all very worth it,” she smiles down at the bundle in her arms.

“I think I’d be forced to agree with you on that one. Where’d Daya n’ Kiyal get off to?” 

“They went to eat at the cafeteria, I think…” Kiyoh sighs, and Kittan can tell she’s definitely thinking about food. It’s the same sigh she had when she was a little kid, about to begin complaining about being hungry. Almost as if it was scripted, that’s what she does next - with a small bite of jealousy towards her husband and sister for being able to get up and move around, and a threat of minor violence if they forgot to sneak her something to eat.

“I’m sure they won’t, Kiyoh. I think Dayakka’d have to be hunted down before he didn’t coddle you both right now.” She smiles at this.

“I think you’re right, really. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this happy. He cried more than even  _ you  _ did at our wedding."

“I dunno, sis, you'll have to check the numbers on that one! Those are tough ones to top.”

“I'll have to double-check, but he really might have you beat!” Kiyoh insisted, and Kittan laughed to himself over her enthusiasm.

“Guess you will. How’s Kiyal get along with her?”   
  


“Well, she was bouncing off the walls… it’s impossible to get her to relax, as usual. Hopefully she’ll have relaxed a bit by the time she comes back.”

“...Kinon dropped by yet?” He says with a heavy smile, already knowing the answer.

“No, not yet. We called her, but she didn’t pick up…” Kiyoh could be hard to read, but Kittan could pick up on the traces of genuine sadness in her voice. It’s what he was hard-wired to do as her big brother. Still, he rubbed his temples in a vague annoyance towards their absent sister.

“Hey, I’m sure she’ll drop by. If she still hasn't after we've dealt with everything out there, I'll drag her here myself. With all that's going on out there right now, I’m amazed my call even got to me, so maybe she just missed it -” 

Kittan was cut off from his pep talk by the first small squawk he ever heard from Anne, who was now squirming against her mother, obviously unappreciative of the conversation happening over her during her nap time - at some point, they must have lost a little too much of their volume control for her liking. Kiyoh, who already seemed like a natural at this, moved to soothe her with a gentle backrub. Kittan, unable to restrain himself anymore, saw this as an opportunity.

“Want me to take her? You’re already tired enough, ‘n all.” 

“Are you sure you don’t just need an excuse to dote on your one and only niece?”  _ Busted, through and through.  _ Her smirk said that she knew every thought that was going through his mind.

“Alright, fine, you caught me. Are you happy now? Give me the baby.”

“Wasn’t it you who taught me that I should always say please and thank you?” She smirked at him. 

“Come on, sis, you know you’re holding out on me.”

Stone cold silence, a snarky smile that continued all throughout it, and then a sigh from Kittan.

“Can I hold her, please?”

“Of course you can.” Kiyoh straightened herself up, shifting her baby into a position she could be more easily transferred to her uncle in, and Kittan matched her posture to safely accept her into his arms. When Kittan met his sister’s eyes, he was sure to stick out his tongue at her for her snark, which she threw right back at him.

Anne fussed a bit more when Kiyoh tilted her back into Kittan’s hold, but as he moved from the bed to settle onto the bedside couch, she relaxed once again. Within minutes, Kittan was left with a dozing newborn in his arms, a smiling sister, and a few tears in his eyes which he tried, and failed, to hide. It had been such a long time since Kiyal had grown too big to be held like this, he had forgotten just how much he liked holding babies - unlike the angry people on the phones that had just been ringing off the hook that he finally got the opportunity to peel himself away from, Anne had nothing to say. She just wanted to eat and sleep, which Kittan could definitely get behind - she was nice and warm, and he thought about how nice it’d be to be able to have an excuse to nap with her in the middle of the day whenever he babysat in the future, once all of the damn nonsense with the moon was over and done with. Something about Anne, from the point he found out she was going to exist in this world to the moment he was living in, was making him look forward to the future in a way he hadn’t quite felt since… well, since Kamina was with them.  _ I’m sure he’d like you, too. He’d call me a sap for being so happy you’re here, but he’d love you to pieces. _

He couldn’t help but notice just how much Anne looked like a carbon copy of her mother, and how much that meant she looked just like  _ their _ mother. That’s when he realized where the strong sense of familiarity he had was coming from - this was a scene much like one of his earliest memories. 

“She looks just like you did when you were a baby, y’know.”

“Kittan, I hardly believe you remember that far back.” 

“Aw, please. It’s fuzzy, but of course I still remember the first time I ever got to be a brother! I’d never forget that.”

“What was it like?” Kiyoh leaned back into the mattress, taking the opportunity to relax without the weight on her chest. She seemed eager to listen, or maybe just eager to take the opportunity to talk to her brother before he inevitably got ushered back into his work for the next few days.

“Well, we didn’t have hospitals or anything like that. Just what we had underground. I wasn’t there when you were born or anything, but I remember being old enough to pull myself up onto the mattress when dad finally let me into the room… I remember being confused that you wouldn’t talk to me, too. Think I thought you didn’t like me. Mom thought it was really funny, though.”

“You must be feeling sentimental, talking about Mom and Dad.” She noticed Kittan wiggle his finger into Anne’s palm, and smile as she reflexively closed her hand around it.

“Maybe a little bit. Babies do that to me, I guess.”

Kiyoh softly laughed under her breath, having run out of things to say on the subject matter. There were a silent few minutes of Kittan basking in the presence of the new baby, but Kiyoh was the one to speak again when the time came.

“Is everything going to be alright out there?” It was a loaded question, and one that prompted a deep sigh from his chest as he weighed the answers in his head. 

“If I’m being honest, I don’t know. Shi- er, stuff’s a little crazy right now. Don’t know what to make of it. Don’t think anyone does.” 

“She can’t understand curses, yet, you know.”

“It’s never too soon to be careful!”

Kiyoh laughed again, and at that moment, the door opened just out of Kittan’s field of vision. When he turned to look, he saw exactly who he was expecting to.

“Hey,” came from Dayakka, who made his way over to his wife like his life depended on it. Given her expression, it likely did, but her face softened when he presented her with the highest form of contraband -  _ food _ . Kittan lets this happen, partially because he’s sure it won’t kill her, and partially because she might have killed him if he tried to get between her and her meal.

Kiyal sat down as gently as her energy-packed body would let her, and she narrowly avoided waking Anne up when she deeply invaded Kittan’s personal space to investigate the sleeping baby. Kittan gently but firmly used his spare arm to nudge her away, at which she pouted. Kittan could tell that Kiyoh likely chewed her ear off to be quiet around the baby, because he’d never seen Kiyal quite this tight-lipped and careful. Still, she found a way to be herself in all of her mannerisms - always bouncing a leg or leaning over to observe Anne. At some point, she used her cell phone to take a very low-quality picture of Kittan holding Anne, his leg crossed over his knee with her resting in the crook of his arm there for extra support, looking down at her with the softest expression she’d ever seen her brother wear. 

At some point, a nurse enters the room and informs Kittan and his youngest sister that visiting hours are over, and they’d have to get going at some point. As little as he wants to go and face the world again tomorrow, after some very warm goodbyes, a couple of hugs, and a kiss to Anne’s head, which was covered in a fascinatingly fluffy tuft of hair, Kittan walked Kiyal home, and then made his way back to his own place. He ignored the TV, which he would normally check, because he didn’t want to see if anything else had gone horribly wrong in the small window of time he spent with his family. He could face that music tomorrow, but for now, everything was alright.

\---

In his last moments, Kittan feels many memories grazing right by him, just like the bullets he had dodged getting into fights that suddenly felt much more distant, harder to grasp than they ever had been. He realizes somewhere in this window of limbo that he has grown much older than he once was, but he wasn’t planning to die here when he left Earth behind - the window of time for choices has passed, though, and he accepts, begrudgingly, that he’ll never get to tell Anne about all of the awesome things he saw at the furthest reaches of the galaxy. It was this, though, that might give her the chance to hear them from anyone else - he’d have to trust in Simon to fill his role on that, maybe. That’s what Kamina would do - that’s what Kamina  _ did _ do. 

The last thing Kittan sees before everything fades to white is a blonde woman on a bed, cradling a newborn in her arms. At first, he has trouble discerning if he is looking through the eyes of himself as a toddler or as a grown man two weeks ago - the realization is made only when he realizes just how  _ proud  _ he is of her, and when the feeling washes over him that everything would turn out right for them. Kiyoh would live to see her daughter grow up, and this daughter would do so out in the open, in a sunny world where nothing would hurt her, because Simon was going to do away with those assholes in space for good, and tell her how it couldn’t have happened without him. The last thing he ever consciously hopes is that someday Anne loves someone as much as he loved his sisters and her.

After that, there’s silence, darkness, and then there’s light. Light that’s blinding, light that won’t go away, so harsh it fills his ears with static and makes him feel like he has a migraine, even without the ability to feel pain.

“Hey.” A voice resounds somewhere around him, cutting through the harsh noise and bringing him somewhat closer to a state of wakefulness.

“I could say it’s been a while, but fuck, you sure are here soon.” It speaks up again, and Kittan only knows that it’s making warmth spread across his chest - 

“Who the hell…?” is all he has the energy to muster, still unable to see through the fading, but still-present light. There’s a figure, though, and he can see that much.

“Really, Bachika? Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten me so soon. Who the hell do you think it is, waiting around for ya like this?”

**Author's Note:**

> babyfever unlimited
> 
> catch me on twitter @kiyalbachika


End file.
